Critical Success Factors in Electronic Commerce: Korean Experiences

Abstract

This article determines critical success factors (CSFs) for electronic commerce (EC), and investigates the explanatory power of these CSFs on firm performance. Through a literature review and interviews with managers in Korean EC firms, a list was compiled of 16 CSFs consisting of 111 items. Questionnaires were administered to managers of EC companies in Seoul, Korea. Survey results show that CSFs have very significant explanatory power for firm performance. Security, privacy, technical expertise, information about goods and services, and variety of goods and services are the most explanatory CSFs. This analysis confirms the fact that customers use EC if they feel comfortable navigating EC for information about a variety of goods and services without technical difficulty and in a secure and private manner. High-performance firms show stronger association between CSFs and performance than lower performance firms do in terms of both Tobin's q and return on assets.